As part of our mission to Improve Lives by Improving Sight, we have started working on a school screening programme to enable children to have access to vision screening in schools which do not currently provide this facility. It has been estimated that up to one million children in UK schools have uncorrected vision and this can have serious implications throughout life as it affects learning and achievement in school and the consequential impact on lifelong employment and career opportunities.
The first Academy school we have supported is located in the West Midlands region in an area with social challenges. The school performance over the last few years has been impacted by poor academic performance, behavioural and attendance problems and the school has experienced leadership challenges. Vision assessments carried out for the 430 primary school students identified potentially uncorrected vision in approximately 10% of all children assessed. The results in the secondary school were more alarming with 20% of 400 students having potentially uncorrected vision requiring further review/assessment.
We are planning to carry out the screening programme in 20 schools this year with the objective of significantly scaling the programme in 2020/2021 to reach out to a further 300 schools. If you are interested in working with us on this initiative, please make contact with the marketing team, via their email
gbmarketing@essilor.co.uk.